Gov. Bev Perdue has included $10.3 million in her 2012 budget proposal to help compensate people impacted decades ago by the state’s sterilization program.

House Speaker Thom Tillis has also expressed support for a compensation plan. But what remains unclear is if the Republican-led General Assembly will be able to find the funding to provide the recommended lump sum payments of $50,000[1] for each surviving eugenics victim.

Charmaine Fuller Cooper, executive director of the N.C. Justice for Sterilization Victims Foundation[2], is hopeful the short session that begins Wednesday will finally bring meaningful compensation to the nearly 2,000 victims, who may still be alive.

But Fuller Cooper says it would be wrong for lawmakers to take that funding from other support services like in-home care and affordable housing for seniors that many of these eugenics victims are also reliant on.

To hear a portion of our interview with Charmaine Fuller Cooper, click below. To hear the full interview, including her final[3] recommendations for compensation and education, visit the radio interview[4] section of the N.C. Policy Watch website: